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Song Of The Day 7/28/2015: James & Gary – “The Godfather’s Daughter”

Dead Horse Radio: Pop Song News Bulletins – The overall strategy behind “Dead Horse Radio,” I’m figuring out just as I’m typing this, is to present the week’s selections in descending order of quality. So today’s entry will be a little bit worse than Monday’s (actually the drop-off is a bit steep even today), then Wednesday’s will be worse than Tuesday’s, until finally on Friday you hear the worst example of the week. In fact Thursday’s and Friday’s selections are so uniquely awkward I’m not sure how they got pressed in the first place. And Friday’s selection just makes you realize that Rebecca Black’s “Friday” is pretty far from the worst idea anybody’s had put on wax. Or in digital format, or whatever. But that won’t stop me from trying to be Mr. Silver Lining, now will it?

So today’s bit, he said optimistically, is the second-best track of the week. “The Godfather’s Daughter” was released by Calgar Records. That’s Calgary without the “y,” although Google’s absolutely positive I meant Calgary. Go Flames. Searching for “Calgary -Calgary” didn’t do that much either, except lead to the brittle, barren Discogs.com page for Calgar Records. Through some extremely unofficial deductive work I’m able to make an educated guess that Calgar was based in Milwaukee.

“The Godfather’s Daughter” was the fourth of Calgary’s five total singles. Maybe not the one that sank the ship, but probably the one that called “Iceberg!”* James & Gary, who I’m going to guess were radio station employees somewhere, offer up a clumsy take on The Godfather using popular R&B singles circa 1974. I admit I probably awarded this second-place because I like the songs they used.

* This is kind of unusual: Calgar didn’t release another single after “The Godfather’s Daughter” – or anything – until 1978, when they put out The Perfections’ “Till I Come Home” backed with “Can This Be Real,” two serviceable but by no means exceptional R&B tracks. Confounding release pattern. But it happens. Just ask Casablanca.